Wired – Bitcoin's Street Sellers

“Welcome to the quickest, most private way to buy the internet’s most successful digital currency: in-person and face-to-face.”–“Buttonwood meetups started in New York a few months ago and fanned out to San Francisco and Los Angeles. Buttonwood is an allusion to the May 17, 1792 agreement, struck under a buttonwood tree at 68 Wall Street, that set down the rules for what became the New York Stock Exchange.”–“After some haggling, Light types Copley’s Bitcoin address into his mobile phone and transfers just over half a Bitcoin ($50) to Copley’s digital wallet [for payment of silver bullion]”.–”He used to buy and sell on a (temporarily shuttered) marketplace called Bitinstant. But a few months ago, ‘it started to ask for too much of my information,’ the student says. Given the nature of his business, he wants to buy Bitcoins without being tracked.”–”These are the kinds of deals that have regulators worried.”–”It’s traditionally been tough to quickly buy Bitcoins with U.S. dollars, and recently it’s become tougher. […] That [regulation has] led to a pretty healthy off-the-books market for Bitcoin traders. […] Buyers and sellers can also hook up over Internet Relay Chat at #bitcoin-otc”–“Buyer’s Best Friend will give you Bitcoins back for cash, much like you can get cash back from a credit card, but you are supposed to purchase something first.”–“Though trading an obscure crypto currency may sound very modern, the whole transaction has a decidedly old-fashioned and human flavor to it.”